A cynic's look at the Obama eulogy in Arizona

By The Political CommentatorJanuary 12, 2011 1:31 pm

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Hasn't this tragedy been politicized enough

I read a line about the Jared Loughner killing spree that to paraphrase went something like this; 'the blood on the ground was not even dry before the left was out pointing the finger of blame for the tragedy in Tucson at the likes of Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, the Tea Party and the rest of the conservative movement.'

Never mind that the facts don't bear this out because as Rahm Emanuel once famously said "you never want a serious crisis to go to waste."

Presidential precedent

There is no doubt precedent for a president to step up and address the nation in times of tragedy and of mourning. Examples include President Reagan after the explosion of the Challenger Shuttle, President Clinton after the Oklahoma City bombing and President Bush after the attacks on 9/11.

In listening to these Presidents speak of the tragedies, they attempted to explain to the American people and the world the scope of the event, the search for the reasons behind them and who the perpetrators in the cases of Oklahoma City and the 9/11 attacks were or might be.

These presidents sought to reassure us, address our grief and at the same time explain what the next steps in the process would be. How those who murdered innocents would be brought to justice and how the government would do everything in its power to insure that events like those would never happen again.

The Tucson murders

The events that took place in Tucson are somewhat different than those discussed above. The perpetrator is known although the exact reasons for his actions are not yet completely clear. His mental state and capacity is fairly obvious from his rambling thoughts that have turned up. His anti-government sentiments were also apparent. He was reported to be a drug abuser, known to local law enforcement and a follower of the ideas of Nietzsche, Hitler and Marx.

While horrendous, the scope of the Tucson shooting is somewhat limited relative to the national tragedies that these prior presidents spoke on. Although President Obama is using the event as an opportunity to address the American people, his comments should be limited to the waste of these senseless deaths, words of sympathy to the family's of the victims, and not meander to those topics more political in nature.

His staff has been working on this speech for two days, yet the content, thoughts and feelings expressed should not have to come out of a ghost writers pen. They should be thoughtful, filled with feeling and from the heart of the man presenting them. It should address six senseless deaths and the wounding of many other innocent people including a nine-year old child. There should be relief expressed about the fact that Rep. Giffords will live and may not suffer permanent brain damage.

I know that I am a cynic, but the trip down to Tucson to deliver this eulogy in prime time smacks of pure political opportunism by a President seeking to build his approval ratings back up. I hope that I am wrong.

16 Comments

Comment by pypypypy January 12, 2011 @ 2:09 pm

Mr Haltman, like you, I am a cynic too. I hate to say this, but whatever the President is going to say in his eulogy, somehow I dont buy. He does not come across to me as genuine and bi-partisan. To me there will always be some underlying political opportunism in his eulogy. If there was none, he should have come out immediately to call out the left continuous finger pointing of blame, after the tragedy. A little too late, I think. He wont be getting my vote in 2012

Great comment. He will not get my vote in 2012 either and it’s not because of this incident and his response to it. I will not vote for anyone I don’t trust and I don’t trust this guy, never have and never will. In my opinion he is arrogent and disrespectful of the American people.

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Comment by pypypypy January 12, 2011 @ 2:47 pm

I can’t agree with you more. Not because of this incident either, nor because he is black (you know how the left will use the race card, as some Hollywood celeb would say that,”it is straight up racism”)

My distrust of him stems back to when he was campaigning to become the Dem party nominee, I could not quite put my finger on what it was with him. It was not until Mr Hannity brought to light his association with Rev Wright and Ayers. Then everything fell into it’s place.

I would vote for any candidate as long as he/she does right by the people of this country and future generations to come. This President is taking this country down a very different path, as we all know. He is slowly but surely transforming this country; drastically during his first 2 years but now he is doing it in smaller steps (only because We The People woke up and took the Democratic House down in Nov 2010, in the voting booths)

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Comment by ter334 January 12, 2011 @ 2:14 pm

Political opportunism is all O and the liberals know. O’s walking on the beach in FL during the oil spill is another political opportunity used by O. He is so wrapped up with his own importance it will be hard for him to be thoughtful and considerate of other people’s difficulties.

With all the attention focused on the tragedy in Tucson, there is one oddity that I find fishy. Rep. Giffords is clinging to her life. She is married to Mark Kelly, the astronaut. And yet there is not a word about Mr. Kelly, which I find most odd, other than the interview on Fox News of West Orange, NJ’s police director, who confirmed that Mark Kelly is Rep. Giffords’ husband.

Surely Mark Kelly has visited his stricken wife. The media has no trouble locating a family member when they set their mind to it – they are all agog over Sheriff Dupnick casting the blame on the likes of Palin, Limbaugh and talk radio in general — but nary a word about the Giffords’ husband, Mark Kelly, though. I cannot fathom why not. It is pure conjecture here, but could it be that Mark Kelly, a military man, does not fit the “media mold” of playing the “blame game”?

I bring this up because both Mark and Scott Kelly, who are fraternal twins — the latter also an astronaut – went to high school in West Orange, NJ, with my elder son, Jonathan. Jon just told me that one of the Kelly brothers, who then was doing some paramedic work, drove me when I was critically ill almost 30 years ago.

Sorry fellas I am neutral in all of this – registered indy, libertarian on some issues, centrist on others – I get newsletters from every stripe because I want to know what they are all thinking and I have to tell you the two biggies (liberal and conservative) could just write each other’s newsletters and blogs switch the names of the affilliation they are dissing! You are each saying the same thing about the other! How sealed off can you be? Neither side is serving anybody this way. Cut it out!

Um, I think you need to take a look at Michelle Malkin’s recent article documenting things said and done by Liberals. Then show us where conservatives have said and done things that match the volume and ferocity of the Left.

There are conservatives who should tone it down, but there is nothing that matches the vitriol and verbal violence (and advocated violence) of the Liberals.

We are waiting to see what you can come up with.

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Comment by kenp January 12, 2011 @ 3:46 pm

First a couple points on the content:
1) Virgina Tech shooting is a much, much more comparable scenario, and President Bush did deliver an address at the memorial there – http://www.vtmagazine.vt.edu/memorial07/convocation.html
2) Neither ‘the left’ nor ‘the right’ is capable of any speeches or actions. It is individuals or (perhaps organizations when they put out releases) with viewpoints along the political spectrum that can do that.
Anyone who blames any politician or public figure for this shooting is wrong – the blame is squarely on the shoulders of the shooter.
That said, it’s the grouping together of individuals (as Mr. Haltman has also, perhaps unwittingly, done) that has caused such a huge us-vs.-them chasm in politics today. The exacerbation of that by individuals at both extremes then stirring the pot with falsehoods or deliberately misleading the populace certainly does not help the discourse be much, much more civil that it would otherwise be.
There are those who are near the edge, and can be driven over it by the state of discourse and the incorrect things they hear. It wasn’t the public figures who got them close to the edge, and they didn’t force individuals close to the edge into doing anything. However, they certainly are not helping people close to the edge from backing away. I have no idea if the shooter in this incident was influenced at all by any public discourse. Since the target was a member of Congress, I think it’s likely the case though. We really don’t have much of an idea as yet as to ‘how close’ he was to the edge though. Only once we know that can we truly know how much impact (though unlikely blame) anyone’s words or actions might have had on him.

Obambi will never allow a good crisis, even those at the expense of the left, to go to waste. That the shooter was a nut job is becoming ever more obvious. That will never deter the left from using this ugly incident as a point to use to bash Conservatives, irregardles of the truth. The truth is always brushed aside by the left if it’s “inconvenient”. Remember, in looking at history, it’s always the left that has employed violence, or the threat of violence, first. SEIU at the Tea Party Rally. SEIU at the banker’s home. ACORN at bank mortgage meetings, filling the room with big thugs. Leftist thugs attempting to intimidate at Tea Party Rallies in Knoxville. War protestors(of a Democrap war started by Kennedy), even a riot at a Democrat National Convention in the sixtiees. The Left is already talking about violent revolution if their efforts in this latest “push” at government fails….the proof of that quickly disappears as soon as the clean up crew can scrub the “Inconvenient Truths” from the net. The left is blatantly obvious and “unfair”, and it amazes me that people still believe what they say at all.

My biggest problem with o’s speech at Tuscon (and I have several) is that as kind as it was for him to be there, he totally ignored the shootings at Ft. Hood, which not only left more than twice the number of people dead (14, including an 8 month along baby in the womb) but WAS politically motivated! Just as the Sheriff Dupnik and others were aware this young man was seriously unhinged, so were many people in authority aware that the Ft. Hood shooter, educated by the Army, was a proud jihadist, member of “Allah’s Army, and NOT one person did a damned thing. the o ignored it with not one public word. It took one week for the shootings to be totally dropped by the msm, and of course, the White House.

This eulogy was no eulogy…it was a straight up political campaign speech, complete with blue T-shirts. For shame. If I was a family member, I’d be outraged. Hell, I’m not, and I’m outraged.

the os had NO business being there, none. His original statement sufficed. He had his appropriate (MAYBE) statement, and that should have ended his involvement.

I was thinking the exact same thing. Why this tragedy? CNN coverage focused on the fact that a member of congress was shot. There is a more disturbing message here. Members of congress are held in higher esteem than their constituents. Remember “all men are created equal”. The country has forgotten this fact because they have forgotten the Creator. The President should never bow to a foreign dignitary because he represents this ideal of our country. Our current president has also forgotten or never believed this fact. Why are the liberals in such an tizzy? They are afraid of the people. They are afraid that the people will rise up again and throw off the shackles of oppression that they so easily clasp on the American people. Sarah Palin and the Tea Party best represent this ideal of FREEDOM and that is why they were the first targets of attack. We can only pray that God will stir in us the sense of liberty again that he stirred in our nations forefathers that we might regain our freedoms from the oppressors amongst us.

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Comment by kenp January 13, 2011 @ 11:42 am

Tonto – again, it’d be helpful to separate individuals from grouping ‘the left’ or ‘the right’ together. I’d agree that the chapter of the SEIU responsible for the protest at the house of the bank lawyer and the individuals involved in the beating of the Tea Partier are clear examples of violence by people on the left of the political spectrum.
Tonto/Dadmiles – There are plenty of examples of individuals on the left and right who exhibit an even greater level and/or support violence at times too. (Though I’d admit that it’s disturbing that a group can come to a decision that it’s ok to protest at someone’s private residence…not a right/left thing, but that’s partly why Westboro disturbs me so much, though I suppose that’s mainly just 1 large family vs. an organization of any sort). Any quick search will bring up dozens if not more examples from both sides of the aisle, but on both counts it’s individuals, not the great majority of people in your town who vote on ‘the left’ or ‘the right’.
RW – Not sure where you’re getting your info from, but it’s flat wrong this time, not misleading. Obama did speak at the memorial for the Ft. Hood victims. I have no idea what you mean by blue T-shirts.
I do however TOTALLY agree with you regarding the coverage being overwhelmingly about the Congresswoman and not about the others… There were profiles on the 6 who died, but I have no idea what’s up with the 12 people reportedly injured. I imagine part of that reason is that none of those 12 were critically wounded, but still… I would agree that something a member of Congress says/thinks is more newsworthy because of the power they hold to do something with their opinion. Their lives are certainly worth no more or less than anyone else. I’m also pissed about New York Rep. Peter King (named the chairman of House Homeland Security Committee in this new Congress nonetheless) who wants exemptions on guns allowed near elected officials and judges. I’m for better enforcement of gun regulations / strict bg checks, but this is clearly a member of Congress being full of themselves. I’m not sure if he happens to be for more gun control in general (certainly possible being from NY as there is certain a gun problem in major cities like that).

“as there is certain a gun problem in major cities like that” I believe that the only gun problem we have in this country is a shortage of armed citizens. How many of these attacks would have been minimized if more law abiding folks carried guns. DC has some of the strictest gun control laws and one of the highest crime rates in the country.

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Comment by RW January 13, 2011 @ 12:38 pm

kenp,

did you not see that “Together we shall thrive” theme for the Tuscon memorial? Look at Dr. Eberle’s “The Loft” commentary…nice pic of the shirts draped over the seats, professionally printed, I might add. Wonder who paid for those, who decided a theme was even needed for a MEMORIAL service? Why weren’t the names of the victims on those shirts, instead of obama’s theme? Shameful to turn this sad time into a campaign rally, to make obama seem concerned.

WHAT memorial at Ft. Hood? I followed that shooting; as a vet, I took that incident kinda personally, and as a mother. I saw/heard NO personal statement given by obama at any time. One was issued through Gibbs. Has anyone else? I searched YouTube, and couldn’t find one. Maybe I missed it all. Guess I must be onnaa dem Rightwing nutcases, blinded by devotion to Palin, ya think?